Scoreboard

'I don't play baseball to hit home runs. I play to win.' Jeff Clement of Marshalltown High School in Iowa, who hit his 71st career home run to set the national prep record Wednesday

By
Associated Press /
July 5, 2002

High school 'king of swat'

Jeff Clement smashed his 71st career home run to set the national high school record Wednesday.

Clement, an 18-year-old catcher who was chosen by the Minnesota Twins in the 12th round of last month's Major League Baseball draft, broke the record of 70 homers by a prep player. It had been set in 1998 by New York Yankees prospect Drew Henson, then at Brighton High School in Michigan.

Major league sluggers hit a record 62 home runs Tuesday, breaking the mark of 57 in one day set April 7, 2000. "The ball must have been traveling well tonight," said Baltimore's Jay Gibbons, who hit the record-breaker against Anaheim Angels pitcher Scott Schoeneweis.

It seemed as if almost everyone was going deep.

Fifty-three players homered on a night when 16 games were played. Detroit's George Lombard homered for the first time since 1998, and Sammy Sosa hit his 28th of the season. A record-tying 12 homers were hit in one game alone, the Chicago White Sox's 17-9 victory over Detroit.

Tennis tempest

The warning to Pakistan from the International Tennis Federation (ITF) came in diplomatic language. But the message was as blunt as an overhead smash: Back off.

Pakistan's threats to punish its No. 1 player, Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi, for playing doubles at Wimbledon with Israel's Amir Hadad, were met Wednesday with a "reminder" from the ITF that discrimination won't be tolerated on political or religious grounds.

Instead of celebrating the success of Qureshi and Hadad, two fringe players who befriended each other scuttling around the international tour and got to the third round at Wimbledon, the top tennis official in Pakistan had denounced the pairing.